Danger goods flood into EU

Almost a thousand dangerous products, many made in China, had to be taken off the EU market last year to remove risks of burns, poisoning, electric shocks and suffocation.

A European Commission report next Thursday (19 April) will show that 924 consumer products including household appliances and baby toys were found to be in breach of EU safety laws and reported to a Europe-wide rapid alert system for consumer safety in 2006.

The majority of problems concerned imported goods, with China the country of origin in 48% of cases.

Products reported to the Rapex system last year include a teddy bear with loose plastic eyes, a home sauna wrap found to cause severe burns and a joke stapler that caused electric shocks.

The items reported failed to meet standards set out in the 2001 EU product safety directive. Many of them also violated safety criteria in sector-specific legislation, particularly directives covering toy safety, cosmetics and low voltage equipment. Rapex covers all consumer products apart from food, medicines and medical devices.

Several plastic toys and teething rings were found to contain dangerous levels of lead and phthalates, a chemical substance controlled by strict EU laws.

Novelty lighters designed to look like ordinary mobile phones or toy cars were also removed from the market. An EU-wide ban on all non child-resistant and disposable novelty lighters was agreed by governments last month.

All the products were withdrawn from sale in the country submitting a safety warning to Rapex. The Commission-managed alert system then warned all other EU countries plus Norway, Iceland and Liechtenstein.

This is the third annual Rapex report and shows a 32% increase in safety notifications from 2005. Stefano Soro, head of the Commission product and service safety unit, said that the increase did not mean the number of dangerous products on the EU market was rising.

"The 2006 figures show that Rapex is working and national authorities are increasingly relying on this as the best way to share information," he explained.

He said that the system was already recognised by professionals around the world. Talks are ongoing to extend the system to cover other countries including Turkey, Croatia and Switzerland.

The EU last November signed a ‘Roadmap for safer toys’ with China. Soro said that as China was the largest single exporter to the EU it was unsurprising to see the largest number of problems coming from that country. He said that the roadmap and other international agreements would help reduce the number of dangerous products being produced around the world.

"It’s all very pragmatic," he said. "This is not about business-bashing: we are developing standards in co-operation with business."

A French diplomat said that Rapex was managing to strike a balance between the free movement of goods and strict market surveillance.

He added that the alert system was also helping the EU keeping fake goods off the market.

"Of course we are all particularly cautious about the risk of dangerous substances in toys," he said, "but this is linked to the issue of counterfeiting: counterfeit goods are more likely to contain a high amount of dangerous substances."

Almost a thousand dangerous products, many made in China, had to be taken off the EU market last year to remove risks of burns, poisoning, electric shocks and suffocation.